Bond tours state to talk about energy prices

Wednesday

May 28, 2008 at 12:01 AMMay 28, 2008 at 9:56 PM

With energy prices setting new records daily, Missouri Sen. Christopher Bond spent Tuesday touring the state, pushing a plan to open large areas of the country to energy exploration and increase the domestic supply of oil and natural gas.

John Hacker

With energy prices setting new records daily, Missouri Sen. Christopher Bond spent Tuesday touring the state, pushing a plan to open large areas of the country to energy exploration and increase the domestic supply of oil and natural gas.

Bond stopped at the headquarters of Tri-State Motor Transit in Duenweg as part of a six-city energy tour to "talk to families and businesses about the need for common-sense solutions to our nation's energy problem," according to a written release from Bond's office.

Bond used the location to talk about increasing domestic exploration and drilling for oil and natural gas to offset the record price of diesel and other motor fuels.

"We must get real about America's energy future," Bond said. "Truckers are suffering record pain at the pump and need our help immediately. The only solution is to open up supplies right here at home that American drivers need and deserve."

Dean Sexton, with D&D Sexton Trucking, Carthage, was in the audience of about 25 trucking company executive, state representatives and industry representatives.

"I stay up with the national trade associations, the American Trucking Association, the truckload carriers, Missouri Motor Carriers, so these are all stories that anybody in my business already knows, but we want solutions," Sexton said. "He hit it right on the head what the problems are, but we need solutions."

Sexton said trucking companies across the company are suffering and trying to figure out ways to make those $1,200 tanks of fuel on a big truck go further.

"As a company you just figure out how to be more efficient and more fluent in how you handle things with truck specing," Sexton said. "We're getting ready to do a big truck order and we're going to do some things to get the fuel mileage up. We're looking to take fuel mileage from six miles to the gallon to seven miles to the gallon. That will save us thousands of dollars."

Glen Garrett, CEO and owner of Tri-State Motor Transit, said he too agreed with Bond's assertion that more exploration and drilling should be part of any energy plan.

"I think he's right on course," Garrett said. "I'm not opposed to conservation, but that won't even register on the scale. I am opposed to government telling us how to run our businesses, this country was built on competition. I think we have let the tree-huggers control what has gone on in this world for too long and I think that Congress needs to stand up."

Garrett said environmental regulations are partly to blame for the current energy crisis and the high cost of diesel is hurting his company.

"It just keeps us from using black ink, plain and simple," Garrett said. "The problem is that freight rates have not kept up with costs. Even though fuel gets all the credit, it's just one of the villains. A new truck costs $30,000 more than it did in 2002 and it's less efficient and weights 800 pounds more because of the pollution equipment on it. That equipment isn't exempt. The tires on that truck cost 38 percent more than they did in '02, the oil in that engine costs 68 percent more than it did in '02 and everything else that it takes to run a truck is between those brackets."

Bond praised Congress for increasing oil and gasoline supplies by stopping the president from delivering oil to the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve.

"While halting deposits to the SPR is a smart short-term fix, it is not a comprehensive solution," Bond's written release said. "Unfortunately, the current leadership of Congress blocked the American Energy Production Act of 2008, a bill Bond co-sponsored to get new oil and gas supplies from northern Alaska off the U.S, coasts and under the Rocky Mountains using modern environmentally friendly technology."

Bond's plan seeks to drill for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in northern Alaska, drill for oil off the east and west coast of the United States, and exploit the oil-shale deposits in Colorado and Utah.

He said environmentalists and ordinary people have to rid themselves of that NIMBY, or Not In My Backyard mentality when it comes to new refineries and exploring for and exploiting new resources.

"People are going to have to look at $4 a gallon gasoline, they're going to have to look at electricity prices going up 150 percent," Bond said. "I've talked to a lot of good sound-thinking Missourians, and if we pass that word to other states, maybe people will start demanding that we take the constraints off and let the energy production go forward in an environmentally-friendly way."